The Bachelor Party
by CliveLive49
Summary: 'I mean to say... Sir... I mean to ask, I suppose, Sir, whether anyone has ever explained to you the particulars of... of the coming together of a man and a woman, Sir, and how this results in the... propagation of mankind'
1. Chapter 1

Thursday Morning

I check the small clock on my bed table, though I know the precise time, as I invariably awaken at four AM without prompting. Still, each morning, when I open my eyes, the clock face is the first thing my gaze alights upon, and I find it reassuring – comforting, almost – to note that the large hand points to 'twelve' and the small to 'four'. It is a routine that never alters.

I sit up to wind the clock, as I always do. I find it an appropriate way to begin the day. As I listen to the click and the crank of the mechanism gathering energy for the day's revolutions, I feel my muscles strengthen and galvanise, and my mind sharpen. By the time the clock is wound, I am fully awake and prepared for whatever challenges the day might bring.

This morning, however, on the first turn of the winding key, my hand slips, and it falls into the covers.

To retrieve it, I must reach beneath Mr. Wooster's arm.

He seems quite deeply asleep, which is something of a relief, as I am loathe to wake him. I slide my fingers carefully beneath his warm, bare flesh, and gain purchase on the key.

His eyes flicker open, and look at me holding the clock in one hand, the key in the other.

'Jeeves,' he says, his voice rough with sleep. 'Why are you winding a clock?' He coughs to clear his throat, and then asks, 'What time is it?'

The scotch in my stomach roils and rises up to burn the back of my throat. My head is still swimming. I have been asleep for only three hours.

'Four in the morning, Sir,' I say.

He lets out a low groan.

The air in the room is warm, heavy and cloying. Thick with the smell of unwashed bodies. There is a sharp undertaste of alcohol to it.

'I couldn't remain abed any longer, Sir,' I say, blinking to clear my eyes.

'Blast it,' he says. 'Go back to sleep. I am.'

I look at him, sprawled on his stomach beneath the covers, his bare arms flung above him across the pillow. His hair is a terrible mess. From here, I can catch the slight smell of stale sweat that rises off him. My bed is not large, and there is little space between us.

'You will have to rise before long in any event, Sir,' I say.

'Why will I?' he asks, opening his muddled eyes again.

I replace the clock and the key on the side table. There is a most terrible crick in my neck.

'Because, Sir,' I say, fixing him with a forlorn look, my stomach turning over once more, 'today is your wedding day.'

6PM the Previous Evening

I am placing a cut tulip in the small, sky-blue bud vase for Mr. Wooster's tea tray, when he enters the flat in a state of some agitation. His clothes are slightly rumpled, his hat askew and his face pale.

I take his hat and coat.

He immediately eyes the tea tray, bud vase and tulip with consternation.

'No tea, today, Jeeves,' he says, fingering his top button, but not undoing it. 'Something a little stronger, I think.'

'Very good, Sir,' I say, and move to the drinks cabinet, pouring him a strong scotch and soda. I am concerned for his wellbeing, but confident that he will tell me all within minutes.

He collapses into a chair, covering his eyes with his hand, as though the light hurts them.

After a moment's thought, I place the scotch and soda on the tea tray beside the flower, and hand it to him on that.

He removes his hand from his eyes and takes the drink with a wan smile.

'I appreciate the gesture, Jeeves,' he says, 'though not even tulips in small, sky-blue bud vases can cheer this Wooster today.' He swallows half the drink in one gulp. 'Something distinctly rummy has transpired.'

'Indeed, Sir?' I ask, still holding the tray. 'Is it any matter in which I might be of assistance, Sir?'

'I don't know, Jeeves,' he says. 'I just don't know.'

'If I may venture, Sir, to enquire as to the specifics of the situation, I may be able to assess the circumstances and determine the probability of a desirable outcome.'

'Yes,' he says, a little absently. 'Well. Desirability is as desirability does, Old Thing.'

I am disconcerted. This does not conform to Mr. Wooster's usual pattern of behaviour upon finding himself in dire straits. He is wont to come to me in a panic, declaring his difficulty dramatically and with little prompting. This quietly-troubled rumination does not suit him at all. It prompts me to ask, quite bluntly,

'What has happened, Sir?'

He looks at me with wide, dazed eyes.

'I'm engaged to be married, Jeeves,' he says.

This is at once a relief and a disappointment. It is a familiar dilemma, and one I can solve with little expenditure of effort. It is not, however, the slightest challenge.

'To whom, Sir, are you engaged?' I ask in a clear, confident tone.

'Angela, Jeeves. My Cousin Angela.' He begins to worry at his bottom lip with his teeth – something I have seen him do very seldom.

'If I may, Sir, I would like to remind you that I have successfully extricated you from many unwanted engagements in the past. Including, if I recall correctly, one to the lady in question. Is there any particular reason why this time should be different, Sir?'

He bites at the nail of his right forefinger.

'I asked _her_, Jeeves.'

I feel the strong urge to take hold of his hand and pull it away from his mouth, for he had his nails manicured only yesterday.

'If you do not desire the match, Sir,' I say, 'might I ask why you felt the need to propose?'

'I thought it would be the best thing to do.'

'Sir?'

He sniffs, and looks at the carpeted floor between his feet.

'She's with child.'

6:30PM

Neither of us has said a word in nearly half an hour.

Mr. Wooster has remained pale and quiet in his chair, sipping at the second half of his drink. I have busied myself with tidying, and have wound every clock in the flat until the mechanisms are tight enough to snap. This is usually an office I perform first thing of a morning, though I do not know with what else to occupy myself. I had completed my duties for the afternoon.

It is approaching seven, however, and soon I find that I must cross to Mr. Wooster and ask,

'Is there anything in particular you would like for dinner this evening, Sir?' I school my voice to remain clear and level.

He looks up at me, as though he had entirely forgotten my existence.

'Would you be terribly hurt, Old Thing,' he says, 'if I said I wasn't hungry this evening?'

'Not at all, Sir,' I say. A touch of panic, though, skitters upwards from my stomach to my breastbone. I am at a loss as to how I will fill the rest of the evening.

Perhaps I shall retire to my room and read.

I suppose, as well, that I will need to pack my things. This will not take long. I have few possessions. The books will be the most troublesome to transport.

If I am entirely honest with myself, I am flabbergasted. This particular turn of events has astonished me beyond what I thought possible.

I had thought Mr. Wooster bungling and naive, but never capable of such a mistake as this, either due to naivety or, more unthinkably, awareness and intent.

To be truthful, I had chosen Mr. Wooster's employ for this precise reason. From the account of his exploits, escapades and temperament in the Ganymede Club Book, it had been evident that he largely avoided the romantic company of women. Matrimonial entanglements seemed anathema to him.

And I have found this borne out by my experience with him. A kiss on the cheek from a lady is enough, I've found, to cause him to blush and to stammer.

I had thought to remain with him until retirement age.

But I am adaptable. I have weathered greater changes than this. I will peruse the Club Book more carefully this time.

Still. The thought of him in a lady's bedchamber. Coercing or coerced into such acts as might lead to this eventuality. I cannot imagine it.

'Might I speak frankly, Sir?' I say, at once, desperate to air something of my opinion. I cannot hold it in any longer.

'Be frank as you like, Jeeves,' he says, in a hollow voice. 'I'm all for the frankness.'

'Very well, Sir. ' I steel myself for his disapproval. 'I was meaning to enquire, Sir, why you did not take all reasonable precautions.'

His brow furrows quite deeply.

'Precautions? You mean...?'

'It is scarcely my place to say such things, Sir. Though, prophylactics, of a kind, Sir, might have been advisable.'

I dislike talking of such matters. I feel the worst kind of prude, admonishing him like this. Though I am angry that his carelessness has led to this circumstance. I am angry that it has caused the upheaval of our quiet domestic situation. I am angry, though I am loathe to admit it, that I must leave him. I have grown fond of Mr. Wooster. Very fond.

'Oh Lord. No. Jeeves – you misunderstand, Old Thing. I've never so much as laid a finger on Angela.'

At this, my anger twists itself into a tangle confusion. It is not a state to which I am used, and it makes me feel slightly ill.

As I struggle to piece my thoughts together, I can only reach one conclusion.

'Sir..' It is quite unthinkable that I should have to explain this. That no one has ever enlightened him on this matter. 'I must tell you that it is quite...' I seldom, if ever, hesitate and review a sentence. In this case, however, I find that my mind will not work nearly as fast as my tongue. 'If you have, as you say, never laid a finger upon your cousin, then it is quite impossible,' I continue, 'that the child could be yours.'

'What are you babbling on about, Jeeves?'

'I mean to say... Sir... I mean to ask, I suppose, Sir, whether anyone has ever explained to you the particulars of...' I can scarcely believe that this stumbling, broken utterance is emerging from my own mouth. '...of the coming together of a man and a woman, Sir,' I finish, 'and how this results in the... propagation of mankind?'

He lets out a bark of a laugh.

'Oh Dear, Jeeves. I fear I've given you the wrong impression.'

'How so, Sir?' I ask, feeling my cheeks heat.

'I know that the nipper's not mine, Jeeves. I might be mentally negligible, but I understand that there's certain things need to be... done, as it were, to bring about... as it were, what? And I'm fairly sure I've been party to none of them in the past. Nowhere near anything like it. No. There's a bun in Angela's oven all right, but be assured that this Wooster's never worn a baker's hat.'

At his new revelation, my confusion deepens further still.

'I apologise, Sir,' I say. 'Your words gave me the distinct impression that-'

'Yes, yes. I know what impression they gave you. Let's speak no more of it.'

'Might I enquire as to the identity of the father, Sir?

'I haven't a blasted clue,' he says. 'Evidently he's scarpered without trace or spoor.'

'May I ask a further question, Sir?'

'Go right ahead, Jeeves.'

'If the child is not yours, Sir, and you are aware of this fact, then why do you feel obligated to marry your cousin?'

'That's the rummy thing, Jeeves. You see. Well, I rather hope you see, because I'm not sure I see, if I'm truthful. She came to me, this afternoon, all of a sudden – I was lunching at the Drones, don't you know, and she paid me a call there.'

'Most irregular, Sir.'

'Rather. I took her to tea at the Savoy.'

'A sage course of action, Sir.'

'I thought so. Yes. And during tea, she rather opened her heart to me, in a manner of speaking. Confided all. Began to – and this was especially hairy, Jeeves – began to cry. Spoke of loss of virtue and a woman's honour. The family name might've been mentioned. And before I knew it, Jeeves, I was down on one knee. Offering to disguise her l. of v. and protect her w.'s h. And save the f. n. from scandal and all other sorts of other dashed noble and selfless abbreviations. She seemed so very grateful, Jeeves.'

He looks remorseful, yet at the same time proud. He holds his chin in the air, as though he expects argument and is ready to refute it.

'It's perhaps the first selfless thing I've ever done, don't you know? I couldn't wriggle out of it. Aunt A.'s over the moon. She knows all, Jeeves. Works out perfectly for the Old Dragon. I can't see a way out of it.'

My mind ticks over like an automaton, scuttling blindly and futilely around the landscape of my thoughts, bumping up again and again against useless ideas.

'I must admit, Sir, that at present, nor can I.' And I truly cannot. 'For what date is the wedding planned, Sir?' I ask.

'Tomorrow, Jeeves,' he says. 'It's tomorrow. St. Mark's Church in Sevenoaks. Afterwards to the Savoy for a cold finger buffet and drinks. The orders of service are going to be in magnolia.'

7:15PM

'If you will not take dinner, Sir, might I pour you another drink?' I ask, unable to think of anything else to say.

It is the early autumn, and the sun is already beginning to set. I illuminate the electric lamps on the mantle and the side table, and then cross to close the curtains. It washes the room in a dim, melancholy light.

'Thanks, Jeeves,' he says, though he does so with such a distracted air that I am not certain he heard the question. 'You must be at a bit of a loose end now, what?' he says. 'No dinner to make. Everything dusted. Clocks wound, what? Pour one for yourself, if you like.'

He takes his silver cigarette case from the coffee table, removes one and lights it. When I turn back to him, his head is wreathed in a thick ring of fragrant, faintly-blue Turkish smoke.

'Thank you, Sir,' I reply, 'though I rarely imbibe, and never when I am working.'

'But you're not working,' he says, 'are you, Old Thing? You've finished your work. And if I run my own bath tomorrow and skip breakfast, then you'll never work for me again.' His voice cracks, and I think for a moment that he may be about to cry. I am inexpressibly glad when he does not. I do not relish weathering extreme displays of emotion.

I hesitate for a moment, and then cross to the drinks cabinet and pour myself a scotch and soda – far more soda than scotch. Then I look at him, sitting dejectedly, his posture slumped and his hair in a terrible mess. My hands itch to smooth it down. He has moved to the chaise longue to spread out.

'Sit down, Jeeves,' he says, realising that I am waiting for a cue.

I cannot sit beside him. I take the straight-backed chair opposite.

The scotch and soda tastes bitter on my tongue. I dislike scotch. My preference is for wines – deep, aged reds, French or Italian – and, if I have my choice of spirits, ports or brandies. Drinks distilled from fruit. Anything fermented from grain sits uneasily upon my stomach.

'Sir,' I say, 'I _will_ run your bath tomorrow morning. And make your breakfast. You will no doubt require sustenance for the long day ahead.'

He drains his glass and gets up to pour another.

'Let's not think that far ahead, ey?' he says. On his way back to the chaise longue, he presses another drink into my left hand. 'We've got a good few hours before we have to think of all that, what?' I am now holding a drink in each hand, and feel rather ridiculous doing so. I quickly drain my first, and get up to replace the glass on the cabinet. When I return to my seat and taste the second, I realise that Mr. Wooster has poured it neat. I sip at it slowly. It makes my lips purse as though it were lemon juice.

'It is not long, Sir,' I say. 'Not long at all.'

I can hear the clock ticking loudly on the mantelpiece.

He drops back down onto his seat unceremoniously.

'I don't want you to leave me, Jeeves,' he says. 'I'd like you to stay on. As my valet.'

'A married man has no need of a valet, Sir,' I say. 'Your wife will no doubt take adequate care of you.'

He looks surprised at this. Almost mortified.

'Oh,' he says. 'Oh.' He drinks from his glass. 'Come to work as my butler, then,' he says. 'We'll have to take a house, I suppose.'

'I have buttled before, Sir,' I say, 'and am not keen to do so again.'

'Right,' he says. He does not ask why. I am immeasurably grateful.

'I'll hire you as the sproutling's tutor, then,' he says. 'I've always believed strongly in the benefits of home schooling.'

'A kind thought, Sir,' I say. 'Though I am a valet. And will remain so.'

'Right,' he says. 'Right. Right. Thought I'd try, you know.'

He opens his silver case again, retrieving another cigarette and lighting it a little clumsily. Then he offers me the case. I take it from his hands, remove a cigarette for myself and close the case. I tap its end lightly against the closed lid, and then accept the lighter from Mr. Wooster's outstretched hand.

Mr. Wooster's cigarettes taste so much better than my inexpensive brand of gasper.

It seems almost unthinkable that it should come to this. That I should leave him with such suddenness. With no fanfare, storm or loud catastrophe. With simply a woman's indiscretion, Mr. Wooster's misplaced valour, and a depressed, regretful 'farewell, Old Thing.'

I find with some surprise that I have nearly drained my glass.

'Sir,' I say, feeling the muscles in my legs slacken and relax as the scotch seeps through them, 'I wish to commend you for your valour in this matter.'

He does not smile.

'Thanks, Old Thing,' he says. 'Do you think I'll regret it?'

I draw long and deep on the cigarette, rolling the smoke around in my mouth, pressing its taste against my palate with my tongue.

'I could not say, Sir. Your intentions, however, are noble. This can only lead to a favourable outcome.'

The mouthful of smoke escapes in increments, one puff with each word. I watch the sentence rise away from my face and dissolve in the air between us.

'I suppose,' he replies. 'Never did hate Cousin Angela, in any case. Always biffed along in a fairly chummy fashion, she and me. And with a nipper to take care of, well. There'll hardly be much time for anything else, what? We'll be fairly cosy. I'm sure.'

'I'm sure, Sir.'

I find with some surprise that I am rolling my empty glass languidly between my fingers. I am not given to idle displays of restless movement. I still my hands immediately. Not, however, before Mr. Wooster has noticed.

'Fill it up, Jeeves,' he says, nodding to the bottle of scotch. 'And bring the bottle back over with you.'

I do so.

As I regain my seat, a thought strikes me.

'Where is the young lady at present, Sir?'

'Aunt Agatha's,' he says. 'I doubt she's having a wedding shower, eh?'

'Very unlikely, Sir,' I say.

'I say,' he exclaims, all of the sudden. His demeanour at once becomes so cheery that I wonder if the story of betrothal has been a practical joke – a ruse to get me to sit down and share a drink with him. Perhaps he will say, 'Gotcha, Old Thing. Who's mentally negligible now?'

Instead, however, he simply says,

'I suppose this is my bachelor party, what?' He sounds both excited and remorseful.

Something tightens in my chest, and I find myself saying,

'I am honoured to be in attendance, Sir.'

At that, he throws me a genuinely grateful smile. He leans forward, takes the scotch bottle from the coffee table and refills both our glasses.

'To matrimony,' he says. I must lift myself slightly from the chair and lean forward awkwardly to touch my glass against his.

The words, 'To matrimony,' however, stick in my throat.

'I am not especially fond of toasts, Sir,' I say, instead.

'No?' he says, draining his glass in one. 'I am. Especially in the morning. With butter.'

'Toast,' I say. 'You are fond of toast, Sir. I am not especially fond of toasts.'

'What?'

'Grilled bread, Sir. I do not dislike grilled bread. I am not especially fond of raising a glass to the health of some intangible concept.'

'You've lost me, Jeeves.'

'That's almost true, Sir.'

My eyelids begin to feel heavy and warm. It seems that they scratch against my irises as I blink.

Mr. Wooster unbuttons his waistcoat, squinting down at the fastenings as he struggles with them. I make to rise and help him.

'No no,' he forestalls me. 'I've got to learn to deal with this myself, what?'

I settle back into my seat and watch him awkwardly undo every stud, and then the Windsor knot of his tie and the top button of his shirt. His collar springs apart. He peels it off and drops it onto the carpet beside him.

He looks at me with a touch of guilt and embarrassment, as though he has made a social faux pas.

'If you want to make yourself more comfortable, Old Thing,' he says, 'feel free.'

'I am quite comfortable, Sir,' I say. This is at once perfectly true and an outright lie. I have never been more comfortable, or more uncomfortable, in my entire life.

'Tosh – strip off some of the old soup and fish,' he demands.

I can scarcely believe I am considering it. But the whiskey has dulled the edges of my inhibitions.

I slowly and precisely unbutton my waistcoat, letting it hang either side of my chest. I unknot my tie and let it hang down similarly. Finally, I undo the top button of my shirt, and breathe deeply as the cool air hits my neck.

'Jeeves, Old Thing,' he says, slowly, 'did you really believe that I knew nothing of... what goes on... you know... in regards to-'

I could sense what he was hedging at, strangely, from the very first word of the sentence.

'You did give that distinct impression, Sir,' I say. 'I apologise,' I add.

'Well,' he says. 'Don't.' He sniffs. He colours from the bottom of his neck to the top of his forehead. 'You were right.'

'Right, Sir?'

'When you implied that I know nothing of a filly and a cove's... joining. I really don't, Jeeves.' He crushes his gasper in the ashtray on the side table, and then picks up the ashtray and hands it to me. I place it between us on the coffee table and carefully snuff out my smouldering cigarette butt in its centre. He takes another gasper, and offers me one for myself.

'I don't understand, Sir,' I say, taking his lighter and leaning to light his gasper.

'I mean just that, Jeeves. I mean... I mean. I know there's something that goes on. Some sort of... something. Something I've never been privy to.'

'Do you truly not know, Sir?' I ignite my own cigarette.

'No one's ever told me. That's hardly my fault, what?'

'Indeed not, Sir.'

He looks at me nervously. His cigarette is balanced on his bottom lip. He pours himself another sloppy slug of whiskey.

He speaks around the cigarette.

'Would you tell me now, Jeeves?' he asks, his voice awkward, his syllables indistinct.

'Tell you, Sir?' I know precisely, though, to what he refers.

'Tell me what goes on? I rather think I ought to know it, before I hitch myself to a filly. Might be expected to do it, after all, before long.'

I know at once that this is a terrible idea.

'I do not think I could be your guide in this particular matter, Sir,' I say. 'It might be more appropriate for you to discover such things yourself. Alternatively, there are several anatomical and medical books I could recommend to you.'

'No, Jeeves. It's got to be now. I need to know.'

'For your wedding night, Sir?'

Though I cannot help but think his need goes further than this.

'That's rather it, Old Thing.'

Once more, I attempt to picture him in a woman's bedchamber. Now that the gears of my mind have been oiled with whiskey, the images are cranked out more easily. He is standing at one side of the bed, she at the other. The covers are white and pristine. He is in full evening dress, she in a nightgown. He is worrying at his bottom lip with his teeth, his own hand rubbing fiercely at the back of his neck.

I think long and hard.

'If I explain this, Sir, you will never tell a soul from where you garnered the information?'

'Not a soul.'

'You will forget immediately that it was I who told you?'

'Immediately.'

I look quite seriously into his eyes.

'If, after I have left your employ, we should meet again, at the theatre, or on the street, or perhaps at a country house at which you are guesting and I am serving, you will never speak of this, or refer to this night, or the information I have gifted you?'

'Never.'

He seems genuine. I have never had reason to doubt his honesty.

'Then I will tell you.'

'Thanks, Old Thing.'

I launch into it before I can reconsider.

'Firstly, Sir, there are the 'bare bones' of the thing. The clinical explanation.'

'Will this be tiresome?'

'Perhaps, Sir.'

'Don't tell me that bit, then. Put it poetically. Like you always do.'

10:00 PM

The scotch bottle is empty. We have opened a new one. A 15-year-old Laphroig that Mr. Wooster was saving for my birthday. My mouth is growing numb to sensation, but more and more alive to the taste of the whiskey. The fumes fill my mouth, my head; rise up into my eyes – I am squinting through an amber cloud.

We have strayed somewhat from our conversational track, lurching down byways of golf, literature and moving pictures. It seems the more we talk of trivial, distracting things, the more serious and emphatic I become.

'You must read Spinoza, Sir,' I urge him.

'Trying to mould the Young Master, Jeeves?' he says.

'Not at all. I believe you would enjoy it. You are so much... cleverer than many give you credit for.'

'Ha!'

'I _know_ it to be true, Sir.'

'Not a patch on you. You're just bally... Marvellous. There's no other word for it, Jeeves. None. Marvellous.'

'You are too kind.'

'I'm never too kind.'

I cannot feel the seat upon which I sit. I might well be sitting upon a cushion of thin air.

'I hope you do not... it is not my accustomed to become recreat-' somehow the last four syllables of the word seem several miles in the distance, '-ionally drunk. Not my custom. I am not accustomed.'

'Not at all, Old Thing,' he says. 'Far be it for me to judge a cove for having a snootful.'

'Indeed, Sir. Far be it.'

He is also extremely drunk, I can tell. But he wears it well. As stylishly as his dinner jacket and white tie, when he gives me full reign to dress him as I would. On me, this level of inebriation is ill-fitting, uncomfortable and rather ridiculous. It is fine to become scandalously intoxicated when you are an affluent, amiable, carefree buffoon. When one is a dignified and respected professional, it is less acceptable.

'You've hauled this corpus to bed in worse states, I dare say,' he goes on.

'I have, Sir. Hauled you to bed. If I say anything untoward, Sir, I hope you will stop me.'

'I won't.'

'Thank you, Sir.'

I find myself wishing that I had never been reserved and graceful, just so that I would not now have an image, so clear as to almost be an hallucination, of scales pouring from Mr. Wooster's eyes and scattering on the newly-cleaned carpet.

'Have you ever been this far under the surface, Jeeves?' he asks, staring at me now as though I'm a curiosity pickled in a jar. 'I can't imagine you have.'

I sway slightly in my seat, and steady myself with a hand on the chair arm.

'I believe, Sir,' I say,' that had I... I would surely not remember it. I will no doubt forget this, come tomorrow. Which is something of a relief.'

'In my experience,' he says, 'one usually remembers more than one cares to.'

'I enjoy a drink at Christmas,' I say, my thoughts blending into one another, forming lazy, attractive patterns like oil dye upon water. 'I believe I have been tipsy once or twice. On Boxing Day.'

'Boxing Day?'

'Pardon, Sir?'

'What, Jeeves?'

'Did you say, "Boxing Day," Sir?'

'What are you on about, Jeeves?'

'Boxing Day, Sir. The day that follows Christmas.'

'Have you ever boxed, Jeeves?'

'As a matter of fact, Sir, I did. In my early youth. I was quite accomplished at the... sport.'

'Is that how you broke your...'

'Nose, Sir?'

'That's the appendage.'

'No, Sir. That was a discreet incident. I was twenty-four, and-'

'Oh, you're going to tell me about it?'

'Do you not wish to hear, Sir?'

'No. No, I do wish to hear. It's just not the sort of thing I can imagine you telling me.'

'Nor can I, Sir. I was twenty-four, and second underbutler at a certain house. The specifics are irrelevant. A chamber maid... she became enamoured of me.'

'Really?'

'Indeed. She was affianced, however, to the first underbutler. He fetched me a sharp blow in the centre of the face. I did not lose consciousness.'

'Gosh. Gosh.'

'Indeed.'

'I mean to say – Jeeves,' he looks at me in awe, 'did you steal the girl from this cove?'

'I did not pay court to her during their engagement, Sir,' I say, feeling ashamed now that I didn't. 'I did, however, woo her after its severance.'

'Tell me more, Jeeves.'

'More of what, Sir?'

'More of this wooing women lark.' I can scarcely remember when we were talking of wooing women. But I follow him. 'You've had them, then?' he asks.

'Yes, Sir. Not a great many. But I have.'

I think of the three women I have been with.

Esther – round, happy and plump, with rosy cheeks, when I was fifteen. She bounced up and down on top of me like a clown at a rodeo.

Gertrude, whose mother was a schoolteacher – curves like a Botticelli painting, and would take me into her mouth without my even asking.

Marigold – the chamber maid – slender, solemn and dark, too much like myself to arouse me much.

At this moment, their names, faces and bodies all meld into one, indistinct, anonymous lover. I cannot describe her.

'Tell me about it,' he says, looking eager as a child waiting for a bedtime story. 'Tell me what it's all about.' And I find the thread of our conversation from before, glowing red like Theseus' string in the labyrinth.

'You must have found a woman beautiful, Sir,' I say. 'Admired a fine profile?'

'Yes. I have. Many a profile.'

'And you must have felt a stirring in response.'

'A stirring? With spoons?'

'An arousal, Sir.'

'I don't follow, Old Fruit.'

I look as pointedly as I can at the front to his trousers. He follows my gaze, and when he realises where it rests, claps his hand over his groin.

'Oh! That. That stirring. Yes. Now and again.'

'This is a response, Sir, that...'

'Sometimes in bed, when I-'

'-You will feel an urge, and you will want to-'

'-and sometimes in the mornings-'

'This is the instinct that leads to reproduction.'

'Jolly good.'

He spreads his legs a little further and unclips his braces from the tops of his trousers.

'So,' he asks, holding his glass by the very rim, his finger on one side, his thumb on the other, swinging it, swirling the scotch inside it so that it licks up the sides of the glass. 'How does one get from a stirring to... baking the cake, as it were?'

'You will have no doubt seen depictions of the anatomy involved, in books of biology, Sir.'

'One or two. A long time ago. They looked like nothing human I'd ever seen. A little like a ram's head and a diving snorkel, as I recall.'

I am growing impatient with his ignorance, which I feel must be partly affected. I suspect, moreover, that he may be exaggerating his lack of knowledge purely in order to urge a description of the act from my mouth. To hear his staid manservant articulating scandalous acts. I am not keen to be his novelty.

'You truly do not understand, Sir,' I say, quite bluntly, 'where you must put the evidence of your arousal, in order to achieve sexual congress?' My tone is admonishing.

'Well... I.'

His mouth is drawn into a think, tight line.

He looks chastened.

'I had an idea that that was the case,' he says. 'Though it's good to have it confirmed.' He shifts on his chair. 'I had... I had all of the pieces of the puzzle, you know. I just... wasn't quite certain how to fit them together.'

This is uttered genuinely, and with quiet embarrassment. I feel I have been a little hard on him.

'It becomes clearer, Sir, when one has engaged in the act one's self. It can seem nonsensical. Comical even. Until one has...'

I grip my thighs quite tightly, holding onto them to steady myself. I feel as though I might float away like a boat unmoored if I did not. My eyes fall closed quite of their own accord. I lose my train of thought. My anger melts like sugar in absinthe. With the knowledge that he is not manipulating me into improper talk, I become suddenly more willing to say things such as,

'Until one has... made love. Then it does become clear.'

'What becomes clear, Old Thing?'

I take a swallow of my whiskey.

'The purpose for it all. The reason for... risking impropriety. Scandal. Unwanted... children. The reason for the stories and the sonnets.'

'Have always wondered.'

'So did I, Sir, until I first felt it. I have-'

I break off, for quite unexpectedly, he has started to sing.

'_What'll I do, when you..._'

'Irving Berlin, Sir?'

'That's the chappy. How do you know it?'

'Perhaps you sang it for me once, Sir.'

'_...are far away, and I am blue,_

_What'll I do?_'

'Indeed, Sir.'

'_When I'm alone, with only dreams of you_

_That won't come blue..._'

'..."True", Sir.'

'_...true, what'll I do?_'

'You have a... charming voice, Sir.'

'_What'll I do with just a..._'

I take up the melody myself,

'_...photograph, to tell my troubles to?_'

And he joins me in the final few bars,

'_When I'm alone with only dreams of you_

_That won't come true,_

_What'll I do?_'

'You have a terrible voice, Jeeves.'

A bubble of laughter escapes from my chest.

'Oh, my goodness,' he says, quickly, 'Sorry, Old Thing.'

'It is quite alright, Sir,' I say. 'I do have... I have quite forgotten what we were saying, Sir.'

'Me too. Oh. We were talking of The Reason For It All. Of... making...'

'Love, Sir,' I finish for him.

'Tell me of making love, Jeeves,' he asks, half-dreamily, half-earnestly.'

'I do not know what there is to say, Sir. I cannot...'

'Surely you can...'

'...I cannot describe what it is like to be inside a woman, Sir.'

I hear him draw in a sharp breath. I fear I may have gone too far.

'Try,' he says. 'Won't you?'

And in attempting to picture it, to put it to words, an astonishing sensory memory washes over me. I am drawn down into my own fantasy as though it is quicksand, and cannot stop myself sinking. I cannot, I find, stop myself speaking.

'It is... it is exquisite,' I say. 'It is the most pleasant physical sensation I have heretofore experienced. You will not be disappointed.'

I open my eyes, and see that he is looking at me intently. His pupils are dilated in the lamplight. His hands are upon his thighs in a posture that almost exactly mirrors my own.

'What sorts of fillies do you like, Jeeves?' he asks.

This is an intimate question. It leaps across the bounds drawn between master and man. At present, however, it seems as innocuous as, 'What sort of day is it, Jeeves?'

'All types, Sir,' I say, with none of the sanguine certainty of 'Clement, Sir, with a light north-easterly breeze.'

His eyes glitter.

'If you had your pick of those amongst our acquaintance?' he asks. 'Which would you choose first?'

It is something I have never thought of. I have not been with a woman in so long.

'Under what circumstance, Sir, might I ever have my pick of those women?'

'Say they were lined up and ready for you,' he licks at his lips, leaving them shining. 'If each of them wanted you. Offered themselves to you for a spot of this 'sexual congress' business. Which would you have of them?'

I do imagine them. In a line, just as he describes. Each grateful for some service rendered. It is an intoxicating thought.

'It is difficult to say, Sir.'

'Difficult because you can't imagine it? Because you don't like to bandy a woman's name about? Because you'd want them all?'

'Miss Honoria Glossop, Sir,' I say, all of a sudden.

His eyes snap to mine.

'By Jove. Really?'

I nod.

'Have you ever looked upon Miss Glossop, Sir?'

'Honoria? What? Yes. I've looked upon her.'

'With that kind of an eye, Sir? I have.'

'I say, Jeeves.'

'I am not ashamed to say it, Sir.'

'I should be.'

'I've always thought that Miss Glossop... has a fine... behind, Sir.'

'I say.'

'If you have glimpsed it in her riding trousers...'

'I'm not entirely sure I want to hear this...'

I am now, however, warming to my theme.

'I find her most attractive, Sir. I have entertained fantasies about her.'

'You absolute cad.'

Now that I have begun, I cannot stop. It is as though I have climbed aboard a mine cart and been dragged down a pitch black tunnel – I must hold on until I emerge into the daylight. 'I would take her roughly, and wish relish, and I believe she would enjoy it.'

Against my better judgement, I find myself stirring, stiffening beneath my trousers. It is compelling, speaking of these things with him. I have never had a close male friend with whom to compare erotic fantasies. 'I would make her whinny,' I say, in a low voice, 'like one of the horses she dotes upon.'

He looks oddly affected by this. He shifts in his seat, and I can see that he is aroused.

'Tell me what it's like, Jeeves,' he says. 'Exactly. Tell me about your first girl, and how you got there.'

'It was a long time ago, Sir.'

'Remember for me.'

I have scarcely even remembered for myself. Perhaps I could, though, for him.

'I went to a mixed school, Sir,' I say, slowly. 'There was a girl in my English grammar classes. I would have been fifteen, she fourteen. I recall she was water monitor. She was slightly overweight, and I recall, when looking at her rump, that I would grow...'

'You like behinds, it seems, Jeeves.'

'I believe I do, Sir.'

I should feel my cheeks heat with embarrassment, but I do not.

'Carry on.'

'...When I noticed her...'

'...Her backside?'

'...I would become...'

'What are you trying to say, Jeeves?'

I knock back the remainder of my drink.

'I would be left with the most terrible cockstand.'

He smiles. I feel the corners of my mouth tugged up along with his, as though they were attached by strings.

I begin to laugh. Small pants of breath at first, through my nose. I feel a wave of laughter gathering strength in my pelvis, frothing at the top like a wave in the ocean, and I am not aware of how great and powerful it has grown until it crashes from my mouth in a loud guffaw. After this, the waves of laughter come quickly and irrepressibly.

Mr. Wooster joins in.

'I say, Jeeves,' he says, 'you're completely smashed.'

'I regret so, Sir,' I say. Then I grow suddenly and desperately serious. 'One night,' I say, 'I asked her to come fishing with me. I believe she knew what I genuinely intended, for neither of us brought along a rod, and neither seemed surprised. She let me lie her down upon the wet grass. I put my hands upon her breasts, and then...'

I am looking at the clock on the wall just above his head. In the periphery of my vision, I see movement, and look down at Mr. Wooster.

I draw in a sudden, shuddering breath.

He has placed his hand between his legs, and is rubbing at the front of his trousers. His eyes are fixed, it seems, upon the flesh of my exposed neck, above where I have undone my top shirt button. I am aware that I have paused in my narrative. Though his hand still moves, throughout my silence. Slowly. Deliberately. I allow myself to watch the motion of his hand candidly, for some indeterminate period of time. Then I catch his eyes for a moment, before returning my gaze to the clock. I continue.

'One hand upon her breasts, Sir,' I say. More quietly. 'And then, Sir, I put one hand down between her legs.'

His hand moves firmly against himself, rubbing at first slowly, and then more brazenly, from the bottom of the long, thick bulge beneath his trousers to the very top. And, like my smile mirrored his involuntarily, my own hand comes up, playing at the crease of my trouser front, tickling at the thick, aroused flesh beneath.

He looks at me as I did at him.

'We did it many times after this, Sir,' I say, all breath. 'We went at it quite wildly. There were scarcely any preliminaries. I would slide right inside her. I am astonished to this day that we did not make a child between us.'

'Jeeves,' he says, his voice oddly strained, 'do you mind very much if I...'

Time stands quite still.

I float in a vacuum, dark and warm, outside of Mr. Wooster's flat, outside of Berkeley Square, outside of myself, perhaps for seconds, perhaps for centuries.

Then the gears and mechanisms of time grind back into action, and Mr. Wooster opens his trousers and takes out his prick.

I scarcely catch a glimpse of it before he wraps it in his fist, pumping it with greedy, staccato strokes.

'I would occasionally...'

'...What would you, Jeeves? What would you do occasionally?'

My own hand, now, is moving more firmly against my own confined cockstand, better matching the brazen, un-self-consciousness of my words.

'I would occasionally please her, Sir, by putting my face in between...'

The more I look at him, stirred by my description, the more I am stirred by it, too. The more I am stirred, perhaps, by the spectacle of him, appreciating it.

'...in between her legs. She had such fine legs, Sir. Thick, firm thighs. I would go between them with my... with my face. With my tongue.'

'Did you, Jeeves? I didn't know such things were...'

'... I assure you it was quite pleasurable, Sir. She tasted of cognac, oysters and dark Soy sauce.'

'I've never tried Soy sauce.'

'She would let me put my tongue right inside her. She would grow so wet for me...' My hips begin to move in slow circles, remarkably precise, for all of the Scotch inside me.

'If you want to make yourself more comfortable, Old Thing,' he says, his voice so much lower and more pointed than the last time he said this, some hours ago, 'feel free.'

I know precisely what he means, and yet I cannot bring myself to comprehend it.

'Sir...' I say – something of a token protest, as I gave before unbuttoning my waistcoat and loosening my tie.

And then, almost eagerly, I undo the buttons on the front of my trousers and draw myself out into my hand.

Mr. Wooster lets go of his cockstand for a brief moment, bringing the back of his hand up to swipe at a drop of sweat that threatens to slide into his right eye. I see, for the first time, that his cock is long, but not thick. The hairs at its base are sandy. It bobs almost amusingly in its sudden release from his grip, shining and stiff.

'Who would you have, Sir,' I ask, 'amongst the women of your circle?'

'Oh,' he says. 'Gosh. I've... I've never really... Wouldn't be preux, what?'

'We are not being "preux," at present, Sir,' I say, feeling injustice that he has encouraged lewd talk from me, before refusing to reciprocate. 'There are no ladies present.'

'I...'

The oddest look comes over his face. It is one of concentration, puzzlement, and intense, focused imagination. As though he is striving to remember something.

'Do you desire none of them, Sir?'

'Well,' he says. 'Well. Florence has a corking profile.'

'She does, Sir. She's a strikingly attractive young woman. Do you look at her body, Sir?'

'You mean..?'

'Her form, Sir. Her hips and her thighs. Do you think of her bosoms?'

He seems entirely struck dumb.

A thought occurs to me. It may not have, under the influence of one fewer drink. But my thoughts are ricocheting in outrageous directions.

It is quite an atrocious thought. But I cannot shake it.

'When you look at a man, Sir,' I say, fixing him with a slightly accusing but un-rebuking stare, 'what do you think then?'

'Jeeves!' he says, clearly outraged. His hand, however, does not slow upon his member.

'I apologise, Sir,' I say, 'though I am curious... to ask... when you see...' I wonder for a moment whether I should pursue this line of thought. Though it is only a moment. My decision-making faculties seem entirely disabled. 'When you see a fine gentleman...' I go on, '...a handsome gentleman of your own class, at a party, or at your club, or at your country house...'

'Don't, Jeeves,' he says. I ignore him.

'...Perhaps a slim, fair undergraduate when you visit your old college at Cambridge. One eager to take a punt down the river with an alumnus...'

'Shut up, Jeeves,' he says. There is something dark and genuinely warning in his voice.

'Or a labourer, working in the fields to bring in the harvest. A rough, uneducated fellow, shirtless in the midday heat, his...'

'Quiet!' he says, angrily. Commandingly.

And I do fall quiet for a second. And then I say,

'When you look at _me_, Sir,' keeping my eyes upon him, 'what do you think of then?'

His eyes widen at the question. He is shocked – scandalised, even.

Yet his hips buck upwards with a little jolt, as though someone has passed a current through him. I watch his cock swell ever so slightly, and a tear of cloudy fluid leaks from the tip.

'Sir,' I say again, indicating quite clearly that I have seen every nuance of his reaction.

'Jeeves,' he says, looking quite lost, intrigued and desperate.

'It's quite alright, Sir,' I say.

'Is it?' he asks, quite seriously.

'Quite alright,' I repeat, pulling a little harder at myself. And then I make a decision. Not a terribly momentous decision, after all. For I know we have been leading up to this since he pressed that first drink into my hand. 'Perhaps we can help each other, Sir.'

And I move without hesitation to sit beside him on the chaise longue.

He does not turn to look at me as I lower myself onto the cushions.

'Spread your legs a little more, Sir,' I say, spreading my own. Then I reach across and take his cockstand into my hand, using only my peripheral vision to guide me.

He apes my movements tentatively, and closes my member in his fist.

Our arms cross at the elbows, and the spot where the inside crease of my elbow touches the hard knob of his elbow, rubbing there steadily, is almost as sensitive as my prick.

Apart from this contact, we are not touching, save our hands on each others' pricks. His hand is cautious at first – his grip quite loose, but it soon tightens. His movements grow as confident as mine. Our undignified noises of mounting excitement form a strange counterpoint to each other. It is the least-romantic sexual encounter I have ever had. And the most electrifying.

'You will make a splendid lover, Sir,' I say, in a low whisper.

'Do you really think so, Jeeves?' he asks.

'Oh yes, Sir. You will lay her down upon the bed...'

'Ah...'

'...And you will kiss her, ever so softly. You will pull loose the strings at the front of her nightgown...'

'Ah...'

'And she will whimper, waiting, knowing what you will do next...'

'Oh...'

'You will let your hand run down her side, until you find her bottom hem...'

'Gosh...'

'...And you will hitch it ever higher, uncovering the pale flesh of her thigh...'

'...Lord.'

'...You will look at her delicate face, and kiss her lips softly, wondering if you should remain to kiss her cheeks and her neck. But you will reconsider. You will place your legs on either side of her, and you will draw your face down the centre of her body, brushing the place between her bosoms, down past her navel, and further down, Sir... further down... with the tip of your nose. You will draw up her nightgown, and touch the bare flesh of her thighs with the flats of your hands, and you will nuzzle at her curls, burrowing deeper until you taste her.'

All the while we work at each other, fisting with quickly-mounting urgency, so fast, hard and gracelessly that we might be working at ourselves.

'You will work at her with your tongue until she is keening and moaning and begging for you to take her. Then you will rise up on your haunches and press inside her, moving within her tight heat...'

He squeezes me a little too hard, and I hiss, but do not stop,

'...first slowly and then more desperately, until she peaks and curls her fingers in your hair.'

We seem connected by a current that passes between us, sparking where our flesh touches.

'Only then will you allow yourself to spend.'

I turn my head, rolling it where it rests against the back of the chaise longue, and look at his flushed, sweating face and his screwed-shut eyes, his wet red lips hung open to draw in great heaves of breath.

'You are so beautiful, Sir,' I say, in what I am painfully aware is a drunken, sentimental voice.

Still, it makes him roll his own head on the back of the chaise longue to look into my eyes.

Before I know it we are leaning towards each other to kiss, softly, experimentally. Inexpertly. We touch our closed lips together, first, and though mine are numb from the whiskey, I can feel his warmth quite distinctly, and the pressure of his mouth on mine. I part my lips and nudge them against his, and he mimics me, so that soon we are pecking at each others' open mouths, sucking out the warm air from inside as our lips seal again and again.

He draws back from me.

'What's this, Jeeves?' he asks.

'I haven't the faintest, Sir,' I reply, and take his mouth in a rougher kiss, opening quite wide and sucking in his tongue to taste against my own. He makes a drawn-out, revelatory sound – an entranced 'hum,' and his hand stalls on my cock, his other hand flailing to grab at my open waistcoat.

'Keep at me, Sir,' I say. 'I'm close to spending.'

And I am. So close that I can almost taste it. I can feel the tickles of shivering pleasure build deep in the bones of my pelvis, anchoring me to a tether of pure sensation. I thrash against it, straining towards a pinnacle just out of reach. My hips jerk minutely – the barely-perceptible evidence of the extraordinary trembling enjoyment filling my insides.

His hand picks up pace again.

'If you were a filly, Jeeves,' he says, talking close against my mouth, 'would you want me to take your honour?'

'I may let you, Sir,' I say. 'If you were persuasive.

'Would you let me do such a thing?'

'I'd let you ride me, Sir.'

'What if I filled you with a child?'

'I'd marry you for fear of scandal, Sir.'

'Would you?'

'Yes. And I'd make you fire your valet.'

And I finally spend quite powerfully, not at all embarrassed that the glossy strings of my seed land over the back of his knuckles.

Through the pleasure of my climax, I continue to fist him, but when I have regained my breath, he still has not come off. More concerned with properly finishing a job started than reciprocating pleasure, I slide to my knees on the floor, position myself between his legs and bend to take his prick into my mouth.

He jerks and gasps, his thighs spasming, his feet rising up minutely from the floor. I move my mouth on him until my lips are stretched quite painfully, and I feel the tip of his cock tickly my soft palate. He tastes nothing like oysters, cognac and soy sauce. I do not know what he tastes like.

I look up at him with eyes so wide and unblinking that the air begins to sting them.

'Jeeves,' he says, through a thick throat, 'was there a filly used to do this for you?'

I bob my head in a nod, and then draw back, the head of his wet prick slipping down my chin.

'Yes, Sir,' I say. 'I found it enthralling. Do you enjoy it?'

'Oh yes,' he says. 'Oh yes, Jeeves, I do.' His thighs twitch against my ears. 'Take me back, Jeeves,' he says, and I slide my mouth over him again.

I am entirely unskilled at this – an inept novice. But so is he, and he is easily impressed. Or must be, for after several seconds of my head bobbing quite messily upon his prick, he screws his face up into an unattractive, focussed grimace, his top lip curled upwards, his teeth bared and his eyes pressed shut, and he lets out one great bellow of relief, his thighs convulsing suddenly about my head. My mouth and throat are full, all at once, with a taste at once clean and filthy, and it leaks from the corners of my mouth as I attempt to swallow it, pleased, repulsed and aroused.

He follows his momentous shout with a number of small, exhausted utterances – tiny 'Oh's that eventually fade into quiet, rapid breath as his erection wilts on my tongue.

I pull my head back from him and sit back on my knees. Then I let my body follow its own momentum backwards, unfolding my legs and collapsing onto my back on the carpet, panting for breath. Swallowing back his taste. All of a sudden my mouth fills with sweet saliva and my stomach spasms. I flip over onto my hands and knees and gag.

'Jeeves,' I hear from above me, through a persistent ringing in my ears.

'I believe I may vomit, Sir,' I explain, my voice loud in my own head.

'Poor thing,' he says, and I am certain that I feel a soft hand in my hair.

Meanwhile, I wretch once, but bring up nothing. I take a deep, deliberate breath and the wave of nausea passes.

'I am alright, Sir,' I say at last. 'The moment has passed.'

His fingers are still carding through my hair. I realise that he is now sitting on the floor beside me. I roll onto my side, and he draws my head into his lap. I try to breathe steadily and slowly against the fabric of his trousers, which I note he has fastened again.

'Oh Lord, Sir,' I say. 'Oh, Lord. This was a terrible idea.'

He laughs softly.

'Poor thing,' he says again. 'Poor Old Thing.'

For a moment, I think that I am in my childhood bed – the small cedar frame with toadstools on the headboard. I have Scarlet Fever, and my Mother is feeling my brow with the back of her small, cool hand.

'Poor boy,' she says. 'My poor little boy.'

And then a thought jerks me back to the present.

'Christ in Heaven,' I say, 'I would have ruined the carpet.'

This time, he does not laugh.

'I don't care about the bally carpet, Jeeves,' he says, his voice still slurred. 'Not in the least.'

'Don't leave me, Sir,' I say at once, feeling ill, feeling small, feeling eight years old, lost without my Mother.

'Silly Thing,' he says, and then hauls me to my bed.

The last thing I am aware of, before I slip into unconsciousness like a bather sinking beneath warm water, is the clock ticking steadily and loudly on the bed table.

4:30 the following morning

I have been unable to rouse Mr. Wooster sufficiently for any meaningful conversation. I decide to leave him to sleep until I am dressed, have breakfasted and gathered my faculties enough to face the day.

'Sir,' I say, to his prone form, 'I will return in half an hour to wake you.'

'Still squiffed,' he murmurs into his pillow. 'Know I am. Headache hasn't even started.'

I, too, am still very much 'under the surface.' I find it difficult to remain steady upon my feet, and the studs on my shirt seem to elude my grasp.

I am only half-dressed, when an horrendous hammering commences at the front door.

Mr. Wooster pulls a pillow to cover his head.

I am entirely unsuitably-attired to greet visitors. At present, however, I do not quite seem to be able to comprehend this. I make my way out into the hallway, gripping doorframes to steady my progress.

The pounding is so loud that it shakes the front door quite violently.

I engage the lock chain and open it a fraction.

Before I can get a glimpse of who is without, the door is kicked inwards, breaking the chain as though it were made of liquorice rope and catching me sharply upon the point of the chin. I am knocked backwards onto the carpet.

I feel moisture on my chin, and when I raise my hand to my face, I realise that I have bitten my bottom lip, and it is bleeding quite profusely.

Before my vision clears, I hear a bellowing voice.

'Get up off the floor, you miserable, deceitful, loathsome worm.'

I blink, and squint at the intruder. He is broad, but not tall, with little hair, and a most abominable soft-fronted shirt. His face is flat and pasty, shimmering with a light sheen of sweat.

I do attempt to gain my feet. I could easily overcome this man if I was sober.

Instead, I fear I shall have to talk my way out.

'Sir, whatever grievance you might...'

'-Shut your despicable mouth. I must say, you're a dashed sight less ugly than I thought you'd be. I had it on the best authority that you were bag-over-the-head material.'

I square myself before him. I am still entirely ignorant of his identity and the reason for his presence, or his ire.

'I fear there may have been something of a misunderstanding,' I say, as placatingly as I can.

'Misunderstanding?' he shrieks. 'I think not. Look at you. You reek of sex.'

I look down at my rumpled clothes and realise with horror that I have donned my trousers from last night. There is a substantial dry stain upon the right knee.

I have never been so dishevelled before a stranger before. Perhaps I am dreaming.

'Is she in there?' he shouts, making to barge towards my bedroom door. Feeling adrenaline strengthen all of my limbs, I block him with my body, raise my arms and push him backwards against the opposite wall. His head impacts with an audible 'thump.'

When the expression of surprise falls away from his face, it reveals one of incredible ire.

'Lay a hand on me, will you, Wooster?' he takes me by the shoulders and attempts to pull me into a wrestling hold. My head at last clearing, I catch his right arm and twist it behind his back. This allows me to bend him forward and grasp his other arm, keeping him in a tight lock, his head between his knees.

It has now occurred to me who this gentleman must be.

'I'll have you arrested for assault,' he says, quite hypocritically, I feel. 'Theft not enough for you, eh?'

'I have stolen nothing,' I say, quite emphatically. I do not bother to correct his misapprehension regarding my identity.

'That's a joke, Wooster,' he hisses. 'You've stolen my fiancé.'


	2. Chapter 2

Bad night's sleep, all told.

Strange, Scotch-fuelled dreams. At one point I am in a Church. Waiting at the altar in a pressed tuxedo. Jeeves is making his way up the aisle towards me. Step-pause, step-pause, step-pause etcetera.

There are a lot of faceless guests in the pews, dressed rather nattily, and though they have no eyes, I can sense they are watching me closely.

For some reason, despite appearances, I know that we are not here, Jeeves and I, to be married. Neither to each other (which doesn't seem that strange an idea in the logic of my dream), nor to anyone else. There is some far more sinister ceremony in progress.

And then I awaken, covered in a light sheen of sweat, and vomit into the waste basket beside Jeeves' bed.

And indeed I know, immediately, that I am in Jeeves' bed and not my own. I'm cursed with something of a miraculous memory, even when deep in my cups. I remember every moment of last night's revelry.

I never knew that such things existed.

This is an outright lie.

Of course I knew. Somewhere inside myself. Somewhere in this overripe melon of a head was an inkling of the true facts of life. The suspicion that there were greater, less innocent pleasures than a well-mixed b&s and the warm feeling of pride engendered by a fine alpine hat.

Perhaps, though, I never expected them to be spelled out for me in such a moving manner.

All I know, is that my body is on fire with the knowledge of it.

I feel every inch of my skin. Every hair that stands up on my right arm, where it lies atop the blanket. The cool caress of the sheet against my toes. The crunch of sleep in my tear ducts, when I blink. The weight between my legs – I feel that most keenly. Thick and aching, chafing against the bedclothes, slightly damp, and slightly desperate. I reach down to touch it. My hand stalls, though, when I hear Jeeves' voice, drifting from the hallway through the closed bedroom door.

I remain very still.

There is someone in the flat.

I can't remember hearing a knock, or Jeeves' exit from the bed. I can, though, feel the heat in the space where he laid beside me last night, slowly leeching out into the cold air of the bedroom. I roll over on top of it to trap it inside the mattress.

The voices continue – the low, sad notes of Jeeves', and another voice – a man's, shrill and stacatto with anger. I can make out tones, but not words.

I believe that there is an argument in progress.

I have heaved my legs over the side of the bed to investigate, when I hear the slam of the front door. Seconds later, the bedroom door opens and Jeeves is standing there, solemn and quiet in the doorway.

His countenance alarms me. He is in his trousers and socks, his shirt half-unbuttoned. He wears no tie or jacket. His hair is unbrilliantined, and a small tuft of it stands up at the back of his head, where it parts, in a fan like a tiny peacock's tail.

He looks out of his depth. And where does that leave me, I wonder, but drowning alongside him?

Still, as I feel myself drowning, I find myself incredibly affected by him. His physical presence is stupendous. The hot weight at my groin thickens and intensifies. I am sitting upon the edge of the bed, with my feet on the floor, and I pull the sheet to cover my lap. I know that he sees me do it.

There is a blinder of a headache pounding behind my eyes. Still, somehow, I manage to tingle with Jeeves' proximity.

'The visitor, Sir,' he says, in a quiet, hoarse voice, 'was Miss Angela's fiancé.'

A wave of relief washes over me, so cool and so bracing that I swear I can feel it on my skin. It raises goose pimples. Angela's fiancé has returned.

'He believes me to be you,' says Jeeves, 'and I have not corrected his assumption. I have succeeded in convincing him that Miss Angela is nowhere in the flat, and that no impropriety has occurred.' I couldn't care a fig about propriety. All that echoes in the hollow Wooster skull is the thought that I shan't have to marry her, after all. I shan't have to leave. I can remain with Jeeves.

'Well done, Old Thing,' I say. My lips separate stickily as I open them to speak. 'You've played a blinder, as always. Was he very argumentative?' My mouth really does feel foul. Swamp-like. I'm sure it reeks. I seem to remember vomiting. Ah. Yes. The waste bin is full of it.

'I fear so, Sir. He fetched me a sharp blow on the chin, though the pain is fading.'

I stand up, and reach out a hand towards him. Though the odd look in his eyes – as though, perhaps, I have pulled on a bright purple cummerbund – makes me withdraw it. I look at his chin. There is no bruise forming yet.

'Dash it, Jeeves,' I say instead, with considerable ire. 'The bounder. Are you quite alright?'

'I assure you, Sir, that I am whole and hale. I apologise for my state of attire.'

'Not at all.' I cover my mouth as I speak. Under the foul sting of regurgitated whiskey, I can taste the veal from last night's dinner at the Drones. Even the egg from yesterday's breakfast.

I look again at the triangle of undervest exposed beneath Jeeves' half-buttoned shirt. It is enticing in a way I cannot describe. The fact that his chest lies just beneath it.

All at once, the memory of last night takes my hand and tugs me along with it, onto the sofa where I sat. Jeeves between my legs, his dark head bobbing there, the small sounds leaking from his wet lips. The frightful, painful, humiliating, naked pleasure of it all.

And then Jeeves' voice tugs me back into the room.

'I feel it vital to impart that Lord Bridlington – that is, Miss Travers' fiancé – has awayed to find his betrothed and effect a reconciliation.' He looks at me, directly in the eye, as he never has when serving me. Most folks indicate awkwardness in the aftermath of something enormous and life-altering by avoiding one's eyes. Jeeves indicates it by looking right at me. There is something closed-off in them that places him further away from me than he's ever been. 'I intimated,' he goes on, 'in the guise of yourself, that in his absence I proposed to Miss Travers merely out of a spirit of cousinly devotion. He was unaware of Miss Angela's condition. I implied that she is pining most dreadfully for him, and strongly hinted that he might receive a positive response were he to go to her and "lay his heart at her feet."'

'By George. You're a marvel.'

'It was a challenge. My appearance and... odour are somewhat incriminating. I must apologise, Sir, I...'

And he trails off, looking with a species of alarm at the waste bin full of vomit beside the bed. I know that he must've noticed it the moment he walked through the door. He has been studiously ignoring it until this moment, its existence too horrifying to process immediately.

'-Whatever you needed to do, Jeeves,' I say, hurriedly. 'Whatever you needed to say. I don't mind.'

'I intimated,' he continues, still looking at the waste bin, 'that he had caught me in the aftermath of a night's revelry.'

'Not entirely untrue, Jeeves.'

He ignores this comment.

'I have not sullied your reputation in any way that might put you in danger from the law, Sir, he says.'

I nod.

'You did what was needed, Old Thing.'

At that, we fall silent.

At last, after several uncomfortable moments, he says,

'I shall remove the waste bin, Sir.'

He does so, picking it up as he might a dead cat. He leaves the room swiftly and silently, and the faint, sharp odour of vomit remains behind. I stand, dropping the sheet back onto the bed, and walk into the bathroom.

All the way, I feel the heavy, thrilling, unbearable shift of my prick between my legs, beneath my pyjamas.

I walk very slowly, and when I get there, I find that Jeeves is already running a bath. This does not surprise me.

The billows of stream touch my skin like hands, stroking across my chest, my sides and my shoulders. I remove my pyjama bottoms and climb into the hot water, as Jeeves stands back to look at me, still distant, though he does not avert his eyes. He has done up the remaining buttons on his shirt, though he hasn't yet put on his tie or shoes.

I pick up a cake of soap from the tray and hold it in my hand.

'Jeeves,' I ask, in a voice as deliberately loud and casual as I can make it, 'would you wash me, Old Thing?'

He steps forward and reaches for the soap. As his fingers touch mine, I do something quite reckless.

I cannot help it. I want so much, and I don't know quite how to ask for it.

I let go of the soap, and it slips from my palm into the water, between my slightly-spread legs. As it sinks to the bottom of the tub, it brushes ever-so-lightly, ever-so-slickly, against my prick, making it twitch. Making it swell. Making the head of it just breach the surface of the water, peeping out comically, like a curious hippo.

Jeeves stands, not too quickly. Betraying no surprise, or disapproval, or disgust. Though still, he looks down at me. Cold, blue eyes, floating in the steam of the bathroom like lighthouse beacons in the fog.

'Get the soap for me, Jeeves,' I ask. 'Would you?' I try to ask it like I'd ask for beef sirloin for dinner, or for a b&s, or for him to fetch the soap, were it on the tray rather than between my legs. It comes out quite differently.

He kneels down again. Undoes the button cuff of his sleeve, and rolls it up to his elbow. I lean back against the head of the tub as he reaches down into the water in one smooth motion, and then removes his hand again, clutching the soap. He does not touch my prick.

All at once, I am incensed. Flushed red with the heat of the bath and the slow-burn of frustration that has been there since I woke, suddenly flared into a blaze of anger.

I make a small sound of demand. When he remains still and stoic, I snatch the soap from his hand and slick up my hands, quickly and defiantly, cant my hips upward and take my stiff, aching cock in my slippery right palm, moving my hand firmly and desperately.

As he watches, with those faraway eyes, I let him know how I feel. My voice emerges petulant and high-pitched.

'You just can't do that, Jeeves,' I say, the words, wrung from my throat like water from a dishtowel. 'You just can't do that... to a... fellow. Show him that... that... sort of thing, and then expect him to...'

I let him see the whole length of my prick. The way it thickens and flushes. Its ruddy colour, bleeding through the slick coating of soap. The way the tiny opening, the small eye, at the head of it winks ever so subtly as I stroke it with the index finger of my other hand.

I do not even know if he is watching. I am looking at myself. At what my hands can't help but do.

Though I hear the smallest wet 'click' in the back of his throat. It makes me think of his mouth. Of the warm, wet cavern of it. Of the saliva it leaks, just like mine.

'I swear to you, Sir,' he says, 'that I did not intend to distress you. I quite lost control.'

I look at him, then, and I see that he has been wanting to touch me, as well, from the moment he awoke.

'Come on then, Jeeves,' I say, pointedly. 'Come on.'

He stands, takes off his shirt and vest, and then his trousers and socks. Silently, efficiently. Folds them and places them on the chair beside the sink. Then he climbs carefully into the bath with me. He sits opposite me, his long legs pressed along the outside of mine.

I let go of my prick, and look directly at his. I have become so fascinated by it that I feel absurd. It is half-hard, pointing almost directly towards me. I am thrilled by the feel of his thighs – the way our skin sticks together, hot and uncomfortable. The hair on his shins. As dark and silken as the hair on his head.

He is looking at me curiously. Ardently. Contemplatively.

His skin glows pink below the waterline. I see it, when the water bobs with our movements – the line across his stomach, where the flushed skin ends and the pale skin begins.

I take myself back in my hand and begin again. Quick, defiantly strokes, with the circle of my hand, and he looks at them – I see where he eyes are focused. Fascinated, mildly disapproving, aloof, but far from calm. He doesn't touch himself. I don't think to touch him. I wish that he would move forward and touch me, though it seems too much to ask.

'I'm so glad,' I say breathlessly. 'So glad that we can remain together, Jeeves. Are you?' I ask. My knees twitch with the pleasure skittering down my legs.

He nods, imperceptibly. And I spend, hard. A more satisfying, freeing, debauched feeling than I felt last night. Last night might've been accidental, you see. This morning, it is deliberate.

My spend lands with a slop in the water between us, and almost, but not quite, touches Jeeves' own prick. I let out a low, unashamed sigh. Jeeves' prick is still stiff, though it does not quite stand straight up against his belly. Still, he does not touch it, or ask me to.

As soon as we climb out, he takes a towel from the shelf and walks into his bedroom, naked. I follow.

We stand beside the bed, and he dries me, gently, with a sort of aloof affection.

As he does, I feel warm, and warmer. With the friction of the towel. With his own naked, glowing presence so close to me. With the knowledge of the fact that finally, perhaps, at the age of twenty-six, I have grown up.

'I love you, Jeeves,' I say, all at once.

'No, Sir,' he says, very quickly. There's no tone of horror in his voice. Nor is he cold. He sounds rather like an old schoolmaster of mine. 'You're mistaken.'

'Don't tell me I'm mistaken, dash it!' I say, quite angrily. 'I think of you all the time. I need you.' I think of all the women for whom I've ever felt a flicker of affection. And then of Jeeves' mouth on me. 'I can't survive without you. When I thought I was going to be separated from you, I damn near lost my mind. If I'm not describing love, then what in the blazes am I describing?'

He looks at me with a kind of stubborn regret.

'Co-dependence, Sir, I fear.'

I want all of a sudden to punch him smack in the nose. Though I don't, because the phone rings.

He leaves me quite naked beside the bed, and turns to open his closet. He takes out a plain, deep blue dressing gown and wraps it around himself, and then goes into the other room. I hear him answer the phone with maddening calm in his voice.

'Yes,' he says. 'Very good.' A pause to listen, and then, 'Very good, Sir.'

When he returns to the bedroom, he says,

'Our presence is required at Lord Bridlington's and Miss Travers' nuptials, Sir.'

9:30AM

I remain silent throughout the car journey. I focus upon my headache to distract myself from matters I would rather not contemplate. It is mid-March, and a late snow has fallen. There is still some remaining on the grass verges that line the road.

Mr. Wooster talks continually. He seems desperate to fill the silence with something. To deny me any opportunity to say,

'Last night, Sir. I believe it may have been...'

I do not intend to say this. I do not intend to say anything, for as long as speaking can be avoided. I am only half-listening to Mr. Wooster's monologue. He is, for the most part, soliloquising on the subject of matrimony, and expressing relief at his narrow escape from its shackles. I concentrate on the slap of cold air against my cheeks, my hands in a throttle-hold on the steering wheel.

'Do you know, Jeeves,' he says, 'there was a song my parents used to sing to me. I remember very little about them, you know, though I remember this song.' He sounds very proud of himself for stumbling upon the memory. 'I rather fancy the Mater used to bounce me on her knee as she sang it to me. I believe it went,

_There I was,_

_Waiting at the church,_

_Waiting at the church, waiting at the church,_

_When I found he'd left me in the lurch,_

_Oh! How it did upset me rather..._

_All at once, he sent me 'round a note,_

_Here's the very note, this is what he wrote:_

"_Can't get away to marry you today,_

_My wife won't let me."_'

'Your parents taught you this song, Sir?' I ask, with a note of disbelief.

'Yes. Yes, I'm sure of it. Or perhaps I heard it in a bar. Can't be sure.'

I have dressed him impeccably. There is a flush upon his cheeks, and a woozy look in his eye, though no one but I would notice. We are some ten miles from Sevenoaks.

He sings the verse again, and I keep my aching eyes trained on the road before me.

10:00AM

When we reach the church, Mr. Wooster's cousin Angela swoops upon me like a great white bird spying scattered seed. Her dress is voluminous and white, and her pale cream veil obscures her face. Her waistline does not betray her lack of innocence, yet.

'Jeeves,' she says. She stands upon tiptoes to kiss my cheek. 'You came, you wonderful Old Thing! How are you?'

'I am well, thank you, Madam,' I reply. I can feel the wet imprint of lipstick and saliva drying upon my face. I will need to find a moment to wipe it off, discreetly.

'Marvellous,' she says, 'marvellous.' And then she launches into a breathless monologue – one she has clearly oft-repeated this morning. 'You'll sit on my side, won't you? We're going to Totleigh afterwards. There's a champagne tent and there'll be dancing. I'm so pleased with my dress. Aunt Agatha really came up trumps at such short notice. We're going to honeymoon in Dartmoor. Lots of castles. It'll be divine.'

I cannot fathom why she is informing a domestic of her honeymoon plans. Though I feel she may not entirely register to whom she is talking. She seems like a broken record, the needle skipping back to play the same part of some tune, again, and again, and again.

At last, she turns to Mr. Wooster, who is approaching the church entrance cautiously from the vehicle. She seems, momentarily, to wake from some sort of trance, and exclaims,

'There he is! Bertie, you Angel.' She kisses him, too, on the cheek. 'You look simply adorable.' For a moment, I believe that she might actually thank him for his selflessness. For the fact that he was willing to sacrifice everything familiar and meaningful to him in his life to care for her, and to raise another man's child. Instead, however, she says, 'You'll sit on my side. We're going to Totleigh afterwards. There's a champagne tent and there'll be dancing. I'm so pleased with my dress. Didn't Aunt Agatha come up trumps?'

Mr. Wooster seems unsure whether or not the question is rhetorical. He is looking at it with badly-disguised horror upon his face. She does not seem to notice this.

'Well,' he says. 'Yes. It's lovely. Very lovely.'

And then Miss Travers notices another open-topped car pulling up before the church, and scurries away to greet the occupants.

Mr. Wooster and I remain, somewhat shell-shocked, before the Church doors.

'Isn't it odd, Jeeves?' he says, quietly.

'Odd, Sir?'

'What comes over women. I mean. Something seems to possess them. At the thought of matrimony.'

'Indeed, Sir.'

'It rather frightens me.'

'It does, Sir?'

'Yes. Though I suppose... I suppose men have their equivalent. That something that sends them mad. At the thought of...'

He looks up, directly, it seems, into the sun. Though the day is bitterly cold, the sky is entirely cloudless.

'I would urge you to lower your eyes, Sir,' I say. 'You will damage your retinas.'

At once, he looks down at the ground.

'Quite,' he says. 'Quite. Sound advice, Old Thing.'

He turns to proceed through the vestibule.

Before he can step over the threshold, however, Lord Bridlington emerges from the church's interior into the clear blue light of the morning.

'Wooster!' he greets, shaking my hand with enthusiasm. For a second, Mr. Wooster seems mired in puzzlement, and then seems to recall the case of mistaken identity. He steps back. I suppose that he fears he might be required to play the part of my valet.

'Lord Bridlington,' I say. 'What ho, Old Chap?' I shake his hand firmly, as an equal.

He looks at me, then, with such a piercing gaze that I am sure he has seen through my facade. I am certain, for a moment that he knows of my lineage, my breeding and my occupation. Of the fact that my mother was a cook and my father an underbutler. That at the age of twelve my father spanked me with his belt for befriending the younger son of a household he served. That my only vocation has ever been to serve a succession of well-bred, carefree, idle gentlemen, destined for nothing, for they already have all they desire. That I have become stuck upon Mr. Wooster, for no fathomable reason, other than the deep, dangerous sense of satisfaction I receive when I am near him. That last night I kissed him, and let him kiss me, and then knelt between his legs and took his prick into my mouth.

Though Bridlington only says,

'Good to see you!' And slaps me hard on the back. The cool air is soothing the ache behind my eyes, though my throat is tight with the possibility of exposure. 'Sound bit of advice you gave me,' he goes on, 'back at your flat. Worked like a dream. Harmony is restored. Topper of a noggin you've got on you, fellow-me-lad.'

I tip my head to the side, with a suggestion of modesty. I clear my throat.

'Oh, tosh and nonsense,' I reply. 'You would've figured it out, I dare say, without my hand in it.'

He eyes Mr. Wooster curiously. Without missing a beat, I place a hand on my master's shoulder. His eyes for a second go wide with panic. I do not, however, introduce him as my valet. Any other day, I might have. Though today, it would be unusually cruel.

'Allow me,' I say, 'to introduce my good friend, Reginald Jarvis. Reginald – Lord Bridlington.'

'What ho,' mumbles Mr. Wooster, nervously.

'Splendid to meet you,' says Lord Bridlington, without emotion. 'Well, must dash. Getting shackled in half an hour, don't you know?' He laughs heartily at his own half-joke, then straightens his top hat and disappears back into the shade of the vestibule.

I look at Mr. Wooster, who is licking his lips repeatedly. He seems more perturbed than I have ever seen him.

10:45AM

The service is mercifully short and utilitarian. Mr. Wooster and I sit as near to the back as we can politely achieve.

The interior of the church is bitterly cold. It is an unremarkable, extremely low-church, Anglican institution. The only splash of colour is the gilt edge of the lectern to the right of the altar.

I feel as though a damp has crept inside me – perhaps last night, when my guard was down. Though Mr. Wooster's presence next to me in the pew feels palpably warm.

I keep my eyes fixed upon the couple at the altar – the frightened, cheerful looks on their round young faces. But I can feel Mr. Wooster next to me. Vibrating with relief that the vows spoken are not his.

As the Reverend asks if there be any persons here present who know of any just reason why these two may not be joined in matrimony, I think of the things Mr. Wooster and I did last night.

All of the wild, uncommon, insane activities we shared.

His face so close to mine. His red mouth, wet. Upon mine.

As the Reverend asks the groom whether he will love, honour, cherish and obey his bride, I think of a trail of smoke, snaking from Mr. Wooster's mouth. The look upon his face as he pulled out his prick, while I spoke filth to him. His prick upon my tongue.

As the Reverend asks the bride whether she will remain beside her husband in sickness or in health, for richer, for poorer, 'til death do them part, I think of Mr. Wooster's spend hitting the bathwater between us. Sinking and twisting in the water, dissolving at the edges.

How I stood up quickly before it touched me.

11:30AM

As the guests depart for Totleigh, I discover that I have lost Mr. Wooster.

I walk back to our vehicle and wait for some fifteen minutes, though he does not come.

At length, I wander around the church, along the narrow gravel path that winds through the tombstones, thinking that perhaps he has taken a walk to clear his head. He is nowhere in evidence.

Finally, I decide to search for him inside the church.

The pews and aisle are silent and still.

There is a small gentleman's washroom on the Epistle side of the church, towards the South Transept. I suppose it is intended for the Vicar, and I feel very much like a trespasser upon entering. Though the Vicar departed the Church shortly after the ceremony, offering his blessings to the new couple and claiming a commitment at a church fete.

Immediately I enter, I know that he is in here.

I shut myself in the washroom and lock the door.

There is a plain wooden screen spanning half the length of the back wall. I suppose that it obscures the toilet bowl. From behind the screen comes slow, steady breathing. Very soft, but just audible.

'Sir?' I say quietly, looking towards the screen.

'Jeeves,' comes his clear, curious voice, 'is that you?'

'Yes, Sir,' I say. 'May I come behind the screen to speak with you?'

'Yes,' he says. 'Yes, yes. I'm quite decent.'

I move behind the screen, and find him sitting upon the closed lid of the toilet, his legs slightly spread, his hands on his knees and his back quite straight. I do not ask why he is in here. He seems like a frightened roe deer ready to bolt.

'I'm sorry I said I loved you, Old Thing,' he says, plainly, in one breath. 'I... it just... you've set something off in me. I've... I've realised it, don't you know? The reason for all the stories and the sonnets.'

My mouth almost curls into a smile at this. Though I do not allow it.

He is still talking.

'This sort of revelation, Jeeves – the sort of revelation... It's just... huge, Jeeves. Bally massive. You've knocked me,' he clenches his hands on his knees, 'knocked me for six.'

He looks furtive, his gaze darting restlessly about the room, his cheeks flushed quite pink. I do not know how to put him at ease. I feel exceedingly ill at ease myself, standing with him in a strange bathroom, in a strange House of God. Under such strange circumstances.

To our right, there is a washbasin, and a small shelf, upon which is a spray jar of pomade, a pot of talcum powder, a cake of Lily of the Valley soap and a small, folded hand towel. I am reading the words 'Lily of the Valley,' etched into the top of the cake of soap in an elaborate, cursive font, when Mr. Wooster suddenly speaks again.

'I was wondering, Jeeves, if you would...'

'How can I be of assistance, Sir?' I ask. I mean to tell him that we must leave soon. I am no more eager than he to attend the wedding reception, though our absence will be noticed. We must at least show our faces.

'It's rather embarrassing, Jeeves.'

'Please, Sir, speak freely. If you feel able.'

'It's just that... it's rather...' He stands, and takes two steps towards me.

'Please, Sir. Simply say what you wish of me. I'm tiring of this interaction.'

I am taken aback by the force of my own words. Since last night, I have been reining something in – some kind of emotion, very similar to anger, and certainly as passionate. Every second, the tenuous hold I have on myself is slipping a little more.

I have never seen Mr. Wooster look more astonished. Never before have I spoken in anger to him. His eyes are wide and glittering. I open my mouth to apologise, though before I can speak, Mr. Wooster interrupts, shocked into confession like a naughty schoolboy caught red-handed at some wicked deed.

His face is burning red, but his voice deliberate and clear.

'I've been stiff since this morning, Jeeves,' he says. 'Since twenty minutes after our bath. I came in here to take care of it, though I began to beat around the bush. I mean. I am in a House of God, and all that. Then you interrupted.'

His naivety. His eagerness. His confusion and discomfort and embarrassment. It is all incredibly... alluring.

I admit it to myself.

I am shocked, and I am thrilled – I am _elated_ – that I have opened his eyes to this badly-kept secret. That he's stumbled through life without any real knowledge or curiosity as people whispered of it behind doors, read about it in the lamplight and practised it in the shadows does not really surprise me. He is so unassuming.

Now he knows. Now I have informed him. This new, knowing, longing person, belongs entirely to me.

When I speak, my voice is thick.

'I'm sorry I spoke so harshly to you, Sir.'

'It's quite alright, Jeeves,' he says, moving closer to me, and closer.

Until he half-falls into me, in a clumsy, unusual, stumbling gesture that brings his face into contact with mine – his left cheek with my right. He rubs himself against me for a moment, and then quickly, he seeks out my mouth. Searching blindly, walking his lips over the skin of my chin and my cheek, leaning his entire weight into me, until he finds my mouth with his and sucks at it, licks at it, mouths it as though he is trying to enunciate words.

'I thought that kisses... I've only ever seen kisses in moving pictures. But last night, you kissed me like this...'

'Yes, Sir,' I say, letting him slip his tongue into my mouth and taste the insides of my cheeks, my tongue, the roof of my mouth.

'This is a real kiss, what?' he fixes his mouth to mine and kisses me openly, wetly, with incredible focus and absorption, for several long moments. Then he pulls back, before moving in to kiss me again, in much the same manner. More confidently. Smoothly. With slightly more flair and embellishment. I am reminded of the way he practises a refrain on the piano.

He urges me to turn around, and sit down upon the toilet seat. Then he climbs into my lap, sitting quite comically, like a lady riding side-saddle, and leans back in to press his mouth to mine. He wraps his arms around my neck. I am enthralled by the cliché of the pose.

He pulls back to ask me,

'How much do you remember, Jeeves, of what we did last night?'

'Everything, Sir.'

'I want to do it again. Over and over again.' He is unbuttoning my shirt, working it out of the waistband of my trousers

'We will be missed at the reception, Sir,' I say.

He ignores me. He stands up and faces me, his crotch at my eye-level. I go to rise as well, but he lays a hand on my shoulder.

'When I said I was stiff, Jeeves,' he says, 'it wasn't in jest. I don't think I can stand it any longer.' He carefully unbuttons the front of his trousers, his breath catching as his fingers brush against his groin. 'Take them down, Jeeves,' he says.

I reach for the waistband and draw it down his legs.

When he lifts his shirt, I can see that his prick is lying upwards within his underwear, the shaft rigid and thickened, the fabric near the waistband translucent with moisture, where the leaking head is outlined against the cotton.

He takes hold of his underwear, pulls it away from himself and then rolls it down, over his prick, down his thighs, to meet his trousers bunched at his knees. He lets out a sigh, not quite of relief. More of elated discomfort.

Then he looks down at his own member.

'Oh,' he says, in a breath – no voice behind it. 'Ah.' And he takes his prick gently in his hand, around the centre of the shaft, wrapping it in a loose hold, as though he's cradling an animal he fears might bite him.

I don't touch him. I sit quite still, and stiff in my pants, and watch him. Watch his hand, and his prick, closely.

He is uncircumcised. I noted this absently last night, and less-so, this morning in the bath. I notice it with fascination now. His foreskin is half-retracted, revealing the swollen, glistening head of his prick.

He moves his hand, once – a tiny, tentative movement, shifting his fingers upon himself, his member twitching and leaking in response.

'Look at this, Jeeves,' he says, with awe. 'Look at it. It's... bally amazing. I never would've guessed.'

And then he begins to move his hand more quickly upon himself, rolling his foreskin down the shaft and up again. He closes his eyes and lets his head fall back on his shoulders. I note, with some disconcertion, that he is standing just as he would if he were urinating. Somehow the thought makes my prick stiffen even more.

'Jeeves,' he says, in the same breathless, possessed voice Miss Angela spoke in earlier, in her fever of impending matrimony, 'if I were a filly, how would you have me?'

I think quite seriously about leaning forward and licking the very tip of his prick. Licking away the bead of moisture that is straining there, swelling there, at the very tip.

'You are a gentleman, Sir,' I say, redundantly.

'Yes,' he says. 'Yes, but if I were a filly. How would you have me?'

'You are the first gentleman who has ever stirred me in this way, Sir,' I say, in a nonsequitor, though I feel the need to explain myself, somehow. 'Though no woman ever... ever...'

'And if I were a woman,' he says, persistent in his fantasy.

'I would... I would sit you down, Sir, upon this seat.'

'Would you?'

I take hold of the outside of his bare thighs. Squeeze the modest layer of muscle there.

'Yes. I would hoist up your skirts and your petticoat, and look long and hard at your legs.' I run my hands down to his knees, feeling the masculine dusting of hair tickle my palms. 'I would unclip your garters. Move my hand between your legs and push aside your underwear.'

He is panting now, licking at his lips again. Bending his head forward, tucking his chin against his chest, looking at his hand fisting his member, and then letting it fall back again his eyes open, fixed on the ceiling.

'And put your fingers inside me, Jeeves?' he asks, his voice high and reedy. 'Kneel down and put your mouth on me?

'Both of those, Sir.'

'Press inside of me, Jeeves?' he asks. For a sick, astonished moment I forget that he is talking hypothetically.

'I'll fuck you, Sir,' I say, looking at his eager, desperate red cock. 'I'll fuck you with your legs bent up over my shoulders, and your face red and sweating, your breasts naked and damp against me. I'll fuck you until you're so wet you slither on me. There'll be tears in your eyes. I'll fuck you until I spend hot inside you. I'll take your virtue, and then I'll take you to the altar.'

'I don't ever want to marry, Jeeves,' he says, in a strangled, defiant tone. 'I... I hate weddings.' And he comes off, his prick disgorging one, then two, then three strings of translucent pearl white, the sound of his hand wet and obscene as he milks himself, and pants through his nose like a racehorse.

His member is stiff for some seconds after he spends, though at length, it wilts.

I have spent in my trousers. I am damp, and uncomfortable, and exposed, although I have not removed an item of my clothing.

I go to the sink, pull down my trousers and clean myself. Then I beckon Mr. Wooster to the sink and clean him, too, quickly but thoroughly. I use the Lily of the Valley soap.

Throughout the drive to Totleigh, Mr. Wooster is silent. All that I seem able to think of is the Vicar, entering his water closet to refresh himself before the evening service. Noticing that the Lily of the Valley engraving has been washed from the surface of his soap cake.

Wondering who could have done such a thing.

2:30 PM

Once at the hall, we show our faces briefly in the champagne tent.

The wedding cake is five-tiered. White, with pink sugar icing roses. Mr. Wooster and I offer our congratulations to the bride and groom, shake their hands, wish them happiness and health.

There is dancing, and subdued merriment – the day is too cold for an outdoor reception, in truth. One can see the white gusts of the guests' breath as they chatter, and laugh, and flirt.

I fetch a glass of champagne for Mr. Wooster, and one for myself. He remains by my side for an hour or so, and then excuses himself to carouse with some of his companions from the Drones Club.

When I tire of sitting on my own beside a table of empty glasses and scattered sugared almonds, I leave the tent and stroll through the trees, down to the river.

I walk slowly along the riverbank, thinking of the women with whom I've shared my body. Those memories, those instances, which stay hidden quietly in my mind, sleeping in my bones, pulsing with their own heartbeats.

And then I think of Mr. Wooster. He is bright, and fresh, and unburdened, and I have such a fierce affection for him that it has shaken all of these sleeping memories awake with an angry shout – shaken them loose from me so that he can climb inside, spread himself out like a languorous housecat on a sun-warmed roof.

I want him more than I have wanted any woman. I have enjoyed the company of women. Though I have never worried that I will lose a woman's affections, attention and companionship.

Every day, every hour, every minute, my first anxiety is that I shall lose Mr. Wooster's.

As the light begins to turn pink with the sunset, I stop walking.

I have reached the small chapel just outside the grounds of Totleigh. It serves a modest group of parishioners. I recall Mr. Wooster informing me once, as we passed in the motorcar, how he attended several lessons of Sunday School here, before he was asked politely not to return after an impertinent question regarding the Tree of Knowledge.

I wonder if it was then that he ceased being curious about sins of the flesh.

As I pass the gates to the tiny graveyard, I see a flash of black and white – a gentleman's tuxedo, incongruous against the green and grey of the grass and headstones.

I open the gate quietly and step inside.

Mr. Wooster is just inside the gates, to the right of the path, staring at a medium-sized Laburnum tree. In his left hand is a half-empty bottle of Champagne, and his bowtie is undone.

'People, Jeeves,' he says, 'at weddings and Christenings. And such. They don't spend enough time in graveyards.' He looks at the tree admiringly. 'They're awfully nice.'

I formulate a response in my mind. It goes, 'I believe, Sir, that most people consider the graveyard a setting anathema to the spirit of such events.' Instead, however, I find myself saying,

'I cannot disagree with you, Sir.'

'Walk beside me, Jeeves,' he says, reaching out for me with a vague, uncoordinated gesture, and for a moment I believe he is about to take my hand. Though his hand drops back to his side, and he begins to amble towards the first bank of tombstones.

He is intoxicated in an entirely different way from last night. He is hazy, and dreamy, and slightly maudlin.

'You think I'm unruffled, don't you, Jeeves?' he says, peering at the face of a stone angel, its nose broken off, its left cheek scarred with a rash of lichen.

'Sir?'

'You think I'm placid, and happy, and unperturbed. You think I've taken all of this in my stride.' He weaves away from the angel.

'Not at all, Sir,' I lie. For I must admit, I had thought something of the kind.

'Well,' he continues, as though I had agreed with him, 'it's a bit much for a chap to take in. Causes one to re-evaluate, what?'

He falls onto his backside against a fairly fresh tombstone. The turf over its top looks fresh, wounded about the edges. Dark seams of recently-disturbed soil, where the grass has been patched back together over the grave. He looks briefly over his shoulder at the name and date, and then rests his head back against the stone and hiccups once.

'Come and sit beside me, Jeeves,' he says. 'There's room.' I am about to protest that it would not be proper, when he continues, 'please. It's awfully important to me.' Carefully, I lower myself to the grass at his side. I do not wish to wet my trousers, and squat upon my haunches to prevent this. 'Jeeves,' he says, turning to me slowly, his head lolling back against the tombstone. 'I had Sunday School here, you know.' He waggles his feet on the end of his legs, where they are spread out straight in front of him. His polished black shoes catch the early-evening light. 'Not against this particular tombstone. I mean – in the chapel.'

'Yes, Sir. I recall you mentioned this, once.'

'Did I? Well. Yes. I did. I had several lessons. It's funny, the things they think it's important to teach us, when we're nippers, isn't it?'

'One could say that, Sir.'

'They seemed desperate to teach us about all these animals. Bunged onto a great big boat, they were, in two-somes, with an older chappie and his immediate family. A bad spell of rain, and then something to do with a dove and some olives. I thought it was tosh, at the time. Then they chucked me out, you know,' he says, 'for asking a perfectly reasonable question. About the knowledge that the tree knew, and that Adam and his filly knew, after they'd eaten of the fruit.'

'Original Sin, Sir.'

'Quite. And then about other things, like, "Why the sudden realisation of nakedness? Why the banishment? And Cain and Abel – why did those two coves suddenly arrive on the scene? Where did they spring from?"'

'All pertinent questions, Sir.'

'They gave vague hints, but I was persistent. I wanted specifics, Jeeves. Specifics.'

'I see, Sir.'

'So they chucked me out. I don't think the Mater and Pater were best pleased. Though there wasn't really any retribution. They were gone so soon after that. And Aunt Agatha was never terribly religiously inclined.' He falls silent for a while. Then he says, 'It's taken me... twenty two years to get around to asking the question again.' He fixes me with a sincere, grateful gaze. 'Thanks, Old Thing. For being more obliging than... Mrs. Turnbull, I believe, was the name of the broad who taught the Sunday School.'

'You are welcome, Sir,' I say, meeting his gaze quite seriously.

He closes his eyes.

'Jeeves,' he asks. 'When I go, will you be buried beside me?'

It is such a surprising question that I cannot help but answer flippantly.

'In the event that I am also dead, Sir, I see no harm in it.'

'No, Jeeves,' he says, disapprovingly. 'No no. I mean it. If I'm dead before you're dead. When you're finally dead, will you be dead beside me?'

The bizarre phrasing should perhaps make me laugh, though it instead makes my chest constrict. I take a deep breath. Eventually, when I am confident my voice will be clear and calm, I answer,

'Very well, Sir. I will be buried beside you.'

'Right. Good. 'Nother question.'

'Yes, Sir?'

'In the meanwhile, will you come to a party, Jeeves?'

'A party, Sir?'

'Yes. A party.'

'Are you certain you are in a fit state to weather more festivity, Sir?'

'Tosh, Jeeves. Yes. Always. Now, answer, "Yes" or, "No." Will you come to my party?'

'Where will this party be held, Sir?'

'My place. Our place. It's a bachelor party, you know?'

'Tonight, Sir?'

'Tonight, and then until I'm dead and then you're dead. Thought we'd make it a bit of a marathon, what?' He looks at me. 'You're not sitting on your bottom.'

I take the champagne bottle gently from his hands and prop it against the headstone. Then I get to my feet, and turn to face him.

'Can you stand, Sir?' I ask.

'Let's give it a try,' he says, reaching up to me, his fists clenching and unclenching, like a child asking to be lifted.

I take him by the elbows and hoist him to his feet.

I tie his bowtie.

He leans heavily against me as we make our way back to the car.


End file.
